Beautiful Sunday

Today is a beautiful sunny day in Ukraine. We didn't even need our coats because it was so warm. We had a very nice visit on the playground with Slava this morning. While there I met a family from Virginia also adopting a boy from Slava's orphanage. They are also adopting a boy from another orphange, so these 2 boys will make 7 children for them. My heart feels for this family because they have been here 8 weeks. It sounds like they are having some difficulties similiar to what we went through in Vasylkiv 4 years ago. We will be praying for them. Our visit with Slava was good. We brought a small soccer ball which we actually purchased as a gift for someone (sorry Ezra it will be a bit used). Slava belly laughed every time Papa & Jordan kicked the ball to each other. We were trying to keep Slava low key because when the lady brought him to us she had many insturctions for us (which we couldn't understand) but big Slava translated the best he could. Basically she told us not to let him run around...yeah right!

After the visit we met Irina at the Zoo. Jordan had a great time looking at the animals and riding on some rides. We were disappointed that her son could not meet us, he had some math competition that he was in. The zoo had lots of animals to see, but Ira told us a sad story about it. She said last year several animals, including the elephant, died because someone put poison in their food. She said since the zoo is located right in the city some people would prefer the valuable land be used for something else. Very sad.

We took a taxi back to our apartment. Our taxi driver looked only about 18, but he did a good job. We are very tired from a good busy day and we're settled in for the rest of the day. I questioned Ira as much as possible about the rest of the process. She will pick us up on Monday at 8am so we can go to the Notary to make the application for Slava's passport. Then at 10am we meet the Judge to pick up our court decree (please pray this happens). I asked Ira if we would be home for Thanksgiving on the 25th, she said she will try. She will know better after she speaks to the man in charge of the passport office. She says some things are not possible, but already the impossible has happened for us. I told her that with God all things are possible! She agreed! God has blessed us with a very good team working for us here. We would not want to do this without them.

So please keep praying for us. Specifically that we will get our court decree on Monday, that we will get the birth certificate and other documents asap (like on Tuesday), and for a miracle that the passport would not take 5 days, and that we will be home for Thanksgiving!!!

Thank you & we love you all!